Shirine Khoury-Haq on “protecting trans people to the end”

[PopstarPoppy]

According to this morning’s news:

Shirine Khoury-Haq said the trans community brought a “massive business benefit” to the Co-op. She told The Telegraph: “These are highly talented people who, if they feel loved, if they feel valued, if they feel like they can bring their whole selves to work, their contribution is immense.”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/05/04/ill-protect-trans-people-to-the-end-vows-co-op-boss/

What about the contribution of WOMEN, Shirine? Don’t they count??

And why does ‘protecting trans people’ have to come at the expense of protecting women?

These useful idiots for the TRA brigade don’t seem to register that it doesn’t have to be either/or, it’s quite possible to work to protect both groups. Trans women do not need to have access to women’s spaces to be protected, they simply need spaces that are separate from those provided for men. The reason that has been repeatedly rejected by the TRA mob says more about the motivations of trans women (requiring the rest of us to validate their identity) than anything else, and is a big part of why we are where we are. If there hadn’t been such a push to be ‘inclusive’ of transwomen in every possible situation – eg forcing through things like describing smear tests as necessary for ‘people with a cervix’ rather than women – there wouldn’t have been the pushback there has been. Nor would we be in this situation had women’s feelings been met with empathy, rather than repeated threats, which ironically undermine the argument that transwomen are no threat to them!

Whaaaat. That's not even a normal way to talk about another human. That's how one might talk about a particular breed of dog. "Labradors are highly intelligent creatures and can make loyal and loving pets if you'll only agree to prevent them eating objects that will kill them".

Cool
Telling staff to break the law is being walked back.

Link to other thread
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5327231-co-op-says-supreme-court-ruling-is-a-step-back?page=1

That’s great!

So she’ll be making sure there’s additional toilets and (if required) changing facilities available in all co-op buildings then?

And doing lots of training with men on acceptance of difference? Thumbs up!

I don't see how such a tiny section of the population manages to make such a big noise. Women make a big noise and we are largely ignored.
I still have loads of Facebook friends posting nonsense such as trans women are biological women every single day. No they are not. Stop being brainwashed.

'Love' a trans person: destroy a woman's rights today.

To the end of what?

Where her bonus meets the cost of provision?💅

Exactly. Or...

"Fat people are great because thy're always so jolly!"

There will be a child who’s been transed somewhere close in her family or work colleagues

I’m also mystified by the idea that people should feel ‘loved’ at work. It’s a workplace. People should feel valued. People should feel they are rewarded for their work. Love is not necessary or even appropriate.

And as for the concept of people ‘bringing their whole selves to work’, I don’t think there are many, if any, jobs where that is appropriate, whatever your sex or gender identity. But even if it were appropriate, many of us wouldn’t be able to do that because if we said “biological sex is real” we’d get dirty looks at best, quite possibly be shunned or bullied, or, at worst, subject to disciplinary proceedings. For stating scientific fact. That’s inclusiveness for you. It doesn’t matter how you identify, you only deserve to be included if you subscribe to the ‘right’ views.

I agree. It's not any more appropriate than to say 'I love disabled people' in the same way you'd say 'I love kittens/chocolate'.

It's unconsciously patronising, it doesn't frame them in any way as equals or even as real, diverse people.

It’s Stonewall language.

When LGBT staff networks would complain to Stonewall that their management wasn’t willing to shell out for Stonewall’s expensive trainings, memberships, tables at events, etc, Stonewall would tell them to push the business case for letting people to bring their whole selves to work and how a happy employee is a productive employee, and how a diverse workforce brings different perspectives (leading to the kind of clunky statements made here) to justify the eye-watering amounts Stonewall charges these companies.

Also, this huge amount that these companies have already invested in LGBT initiatives over the past 10 years mean the sunk costs fallacy is probably playing a part for many of these business leaders.

So it’s no surprise that the bosses who’ve been sold this snake oil are still going around now saying ‘but look at my snake oil’.

The co-op makes more sense in sticking to this line than many orgs, as they don’t have shareholders to worry about, so I’d imagine that they are slightly more free to prioritise what they see as the loudest customer voice, which sounds like it was the non-binary one, over an expensive legal risk which likely wouldn’t be acceptable to the shareholders of most PLCs.

They still aren’t entitled to break the law, though, and I do wonder whether some of these orgs are deliberately putting their heads above the parapet in defiance to look like they’re prioritising trans rights and so the EHRC will publicly slap them down and they can say “well, we tried, but you have to get out of the ladies loos now, Geoff”.

Maybe time to move my bank account from the Co-op.

I wonder if the Co-op are due another incompetence scandal (they seem to have ‘lost’ ( allowed to be stolen) lots of customers’ data. So maybe she is waving frantically in the opposite direction?

She may just be an idiot, though.

Change it to a race/nationality/religion , and add stereotype of your choice and see how far you get...

Can you give us some examples of victimisation?

They aren't terrified they're furious. And they aren't victimised. They've just been told they aren't to break the law any more.

The Co-op started as part of the people’s co-operative movement, and it has always had an ethical basis. Which makes it all the more disappointing that today’s leaders have jumped on the currently fashionable ‘gender identity’ bandwagon.

It doesn’t take a lot of effort to see through the poor-little-me facade to the ages-old misogyny.

How can an ‘absolutely minuscule population - you’ll never even meet one’ be a “massive business benefit”? Both things cannot be true.

My SIL used to work for the COOP bank, they treated their employees appallingly! As a single parent, they had no compassion when asked if they could have a couple of days off to look after their sick baby.

She used a surrogate to carry twins. She was willing to subject another woman to a high risk twin pregnancy for her own selfish reasons. This is not someone who cares for women.

That what I was thinking, if she said that about disabled workers for example people would be saying she was patronising!
Trans people aren’t some kind of superhuman.
The best way companies can support their trans staff now is to promise to provide third spaces. Stop giving away women’s single sex spaces!!

Where were you over the last few years when several victimised and terrified groups of women were told over and over again that they were bigots who needed to educate themselves for stating the obvious truths that males don't belong in female prisons, refuges or anywhere else where women, girls and young children are vulnerable and need a male-free space for privacy and safety; males don't belong in women's sports because it's unfair and it's unsafe; male pattern violence shows up in the same way in trans-identified males as in other males so they need to be subject to the same safeguarding; and so on. How was your moral compass doing then?

This is gaslighting. Most people don’t support gender identity ideology. Have you ever stopped to consider that your worldview that a group of men should be considered women on their say so is misogynistic and irrational?